Ahmadu Bello and the Challenges of Nation-Building in Nigeria

Abstract

In many ways, the structural constraints and opportunities of the peculiar trajectories of what became the colony of Northern Nigeria and eventually the federation of Nigeria determined and largely transformed the personal and political agency of Sir Ahmadu Bello, the first and only premier of the Northern Region of Nigeria (1954-1966). By extension, Bello’s personal and political agency also helped in reshaping modern Northern Nigeria, and thus contributed immensely to the shaping of the future of Nigeria. The Northern Nigerian Protectorate, as the British officially called the colony that it formally acquired in 1900, was the largest and most populous of the two regions that were amalgamated in 1914 to form the Protectorate and Colony of Nigeria. As Bello’s biographer, John N. Paden (1986: 6) argues, “One advantage of studying the life of an individual is to try to see how larger-scale changes in society are reflected in a specific case. On the other hand, when dealing with a leader of the magnitude of Ahmadu Bello, the other side of the coin is how much a key individual can influence the redefinition or change values.”

The original version of this chapter was delivered at the Centennial Celebration of Sir Ahmadu Bello and Sir Abubakar Tafawa Balewa organized by the Sir Ahmadu Bello Memorial Foundation on December 3, 2012 in Abuja, Nigeria. It has been substantially revised for this volume.